Wallström to target pollution from traffic

MEASURES to combat traffic congestion will be a key priority of the European Commission’s next environmental action programme in the wake of a report predicting that transport will become the largest single contributor to EU greenhouse gas emissions in the next few years.

Environment Commissioner Margot Wallström says the study by the European Environment Agency (EEA) paints a “grim picture” and “is a sign that we have our priorities wrong.”

The report warns that rapidly growing volumes of transport, especially on roads and in the skies, have overshadowed environmental gains in other areas in recent years. As the danger grows that the Union will fall far short of meeting the climate change pledges it made at Kyoto in 1997, pressure is growing on Union governments to take tougher action to curb emissions.

An aide to the Commissioner said the sixth action programme, which is due to be unveiled in the autumn, would also emphasise the need to integrate environmental concerns into other policy areas such as transport and agriculture. “A key message which has come out of the EEA report is that environmental policy cannot solve the problems alone,” he said.

The study, which is based on figures from statistical agency Eurostat, is seen as the first real assessment of member states’ progress in implementing Union environmental legislation.

The report found that the shift from rail to road transport between 1970-1996 had resulted in a massive 195% increase in the total length of motorways in the Union. This was matched by a decrease in rail infrastructure, according to researchers, who gave the Union either poor or neutral marks for transport ‘eco-efficiency’.

The Commission plans to use the EEA’s environmental indicators alongside other, more specialised estimates of the environmental, economic and social impact of developments in various sectors when formulating a separate sustainable development strategy also due to be unveiled later this year.

The report warns that total greenhouse gas emissions have increased across the Union as a whole in recent years and predicts that they will rise by 6% between 1990 and 2010 if no action is taken to curb them.

Attention is focusing on the transport and energy sectors, both of which have experienced tremendous growth in recent years. The EEA study found that the overall use of energy has also increased in the last decade, with the potential for the use of renewables “some way” from being realised, despite the Union’s long-term goal of doubling their use to 12% of total energy by 2010.

But the report’s findings are not entirely negative. Member states received positive marks for their achievements in reducing air pollution, increasing the recycling of packaging materials and decreasing sulphur production.